This year I have been hearing alot of hunters talking about the number of young fawns they saw during the hunting season. I have trail cam photos from 2 weeks ago of alot of does, and often a few minutes later 1 or 2 bucks following the trail. Some have mentioned that with the late year fawns coming into estrous later, that the bucks are still chasing. Can this be the start of a trend?

Here’s my logic… tell me what you think. If year #1, there are 100 does in estrous late, and they all give birth late, and they give birth to 120 fawns, let’s say that 20 are born bucks, so we end up with 100 more dow fawns coming into their first estrous late. Do the original 100 continue to estrous late or do they start falling into the rest of the herd? If they continue to be later in the season, then doesn’t logic say that each year more and more will be coming into estrous late? And if that is so, then would “the rut” start either lengthening, or start moving to follow the doe estrous?

I’m fairly new to deer hunting, and only in the past couple of years have i had access to property that has the potential for a large number of deer, but my uncle has been on the same property for 20+ years, and he has noticed that the rut activity has spread out over time. What use to be 2 weeks of non-stop rut activity has turned into 2 months of sporadic sightings. When he first let me start hunting with him, he would tell me stories of having 1-2 weeks of 15-20 does out in the fields being chased and how cool and exiting it was, even if you did not get a shot. Now it seems to be a gradual rise, with no real “peak”.

As I said, I’m fairly new, so, teach me old grasshoppers, and let me see the error in my logic

Great to see that a new hunter is paying attention to things beyond just the hunt.

The rut seems to have been a bit strange lately, but nothing that leads me to believe things are changing all that much. I think we, as hunters, are simply paying more attention now and noticing that a second rut really does occur. The peak of the rut, in my humble opinion, doe snot last for two weeks. The rut itself does, but not the peak. The peak in any given area usually only last a few days. If you’re in the woods for those few days, you’ll know it. Bucks seem to be literally everywhere.

Late fawns have always been around. I don’t think I’ve noticed more late fawns this year than any other year. I did have one on trail camera video a few times that was ridiculously tiny and kept his spots extra long. He ended up geting run through a mower conditioner while laying in some not-very-tall alfalfa in late September. I never had any video of him with a doe. I believe he was abandoned for some reason.

Don’t take this as gospel either but I don’t believe the yearlings new born have a real high survival rate either. Since they are young themselves and the first time being a mother. I have heard as low as 20%. But after that first year Mother Nature does her job and gets them into that fall breeding.